In Paris director Claude Berri was born Claude Berel Langmann to Eastern European Jewish immigrant parents, on July 1, 1934, making him 9 years old in November, 1943. But in the first line of the film Claude Langmann says as an adult in a voiceover "In November, 1943, I was 8 years old." Alain Cohen, who played the boy in the film, was age 8 during the 3 month film shoot that started in July, 1966, which is probably why "8 years old" was used. Like the boy in the film, Claude Berri was sent away during the occupation of Paris to live with a non-Jewish family and his name was changed to be more "French."
This film is part of the Criterion Collection, spine #388.
"The Two of Us" ("Le vieil homme et l'enfant") was director Claude Berri's first full-length film.
Mémé says Claude is age 9 while bandaging his head (at 0:38:36 on BD), so this was in 1944 and his birthday passed without celebration in the film.
Filming was done in France at Studios Éclair in Épinay sur Seine just north of Paris as well as roughly 400 miles south-southeast of Paris at the villages of Biviers (just northeast of Grenoble) and Saint-Vincent-de-Mercuze (13 miles further northeast).